


a rubble of tendons, knuckles and raw sinews.

by ThegHostofYourHeaRt



Series: The grief of hurting is its own burden. [1]
Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Dreams and Nightmares, F/F, Injury Recovery, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Post-Battle of Sodden Hill, Pre-Relationship, sickness/ injury
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-21 00:28:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30013314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThegHostofYourHeaRt/pseuds/ThegHostofYourHeaRt
Summary: The continent is on the brink of collapse, there is no real hope to follow after the damning battle of Sodden Hill. But they are at a stand-by, with broken bodies and open wounds apart of a world that threatens to vanish they live in a space in between.Will they stand together?
Relationships: Tissaia de Vries/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Series: The grief of hurting is its own burden. [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2207865
Kudos: 9





	a rubble of tendons, knuckles and raw sinews.

**Author's Note:**

> I really don't know anything about canon, I looked up just the essential information and ran with it, but this thing has grown so much that I cant even. thank you if you give it a chance.
> 
> another note: the titles are from lines of poetry.

Sodden changes all.

  
  
  


Everything is hot, her blood boils, she feels her skin bubbling, but the screams that inside of her are trapped inside her chest, their weight heavy, smothering. She is dying, she can feel it, how her body is collapsing on itself. How the pain, the pain makes her go insane to the point to tear herself apart. She wants to dig into her flesh, open her chest to get away.

She has no sense of herself, all is just a constant flow of nothingness and agony. She floats between the burning pain of her body ripping her apart, to then submerge in memories, in dreams. Twisted nightmares. She sees herself again, her clothes old and wet, her hands blackened by dirt. She is back at the pigpen huddled with the animals in search of heat, her body cramps as it rains outside and she feels the deformity of her being, the constant ache of hunger and cold, she is back, she is back in the filth and she aches, she aches so much. the desperation floods her body, her jaw trembles and locks in place, snot seeps between her lips and her vision blurs. She is back.

The cold becomes unbearable she reaches between the hind legs of the pig beside her and she cups his testicles in search of heat but the pig wakes up, it shrieks, its movements violent waking the others up she is pushed against the mud and the animals come against her she feels the first bite in her stomach, tearing cloth and flesh, before the others come, tearing through skin. Her scream is soundless, she trashes helpless. Alone and sees him above, a shadow always always above, he’s twisted grimace, disdain and loathing. Disgust. He doesn't speak; he just pulls back the spading fork; his mouth twisting horribly he pushes it through her face.

She pulls air to her lungs, it is heavy and tangible in a way air isn't, her body pushes against it but she can't hold its weight. She goes down again, anything solid vanishing behind her. Nothingness again, her body is slack but she keeps falling small and weak. Powerless in the distortion, the deviation of her spine, her face. she is still there. in such a small and strange frame.

she is filled with such a devastating sadness, her chest collapsing in on itself, her heart stabbed by the weight of her anguish. the sound that comes out of her mouth gets lost in her surroundings, the painful gasp becomes nothing in the infinity of the space that surrounds her.

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She opens her eyes, to yellow and white, to his strong and beautiful face. She turns her face away, shame tainting her action. Even so unlike her she feels too vulnerable. Exposed truths.

_Yennefer_ _. _

Echoes her voice around his voice on her head.

_ Look at me, Yennefer. _

His voice is soft, as it mingles with hers again, in a warm whisper that fills her body, it crawls under her skin flooding everything. Her body tenses unwillingly by her choice, she doesn't want to look at him, she doesn't want him to look at her, the warmth that fills her body slowly turns her head to him. His eyes are tender, his already rare smile soft, boyish. So inviting, so open. Waiting.

But she doesn't want him, not like this.

He extends his hand towards her, big and callused.

_ Come. _

**No** . She thinks. Forcing her body to still, but her body went without answer responding to him she saw her hand reach for him. **No** . She thinks again, panic shocking her body. The old fright surges again, the uncertainty of her own independence being threatened, eclipsed. She was once again submitted by the actions of her body. She hasn't forgiven him, she hasn't forgiven herself for her own betrayal, the absolute treason against herself.

Still, she takes his hand, it looks so delicate in his, it is lost behind his fingers

_ Yennefer. _

He and her call again, his voice full of wanting, full of need. Her own soft and deferent.

He pulls her to him until her body falls into him and his arms close around her body keeping her still. 

And this, this was one of her biggest most present fears, because at that moment she wasn't of her own. Again she belongs to another and gets drawn in the flesh of him. She disappears again.

Her body dissolves into him, no matter the proficiency of her power, her tenacity, no matter her desperation, the punishment and the rejection. All she gave up just to be, all that she has left behind for the chance to become something. 

Will she end like this? a subordinate of another life after so much fighting? will she lend herself away?

She is smothering, the panic and anguish of her own devastation too heavy to bear, she was not supposed to end like this. 

“ **No** ” she roars, her voice scratching at her throat, the word burning in her mouth.

His flesh tears away from her like fabric, as his skin has become hers. All that was surrounding her falls around her and what he was becomes nothing.

l l ll l

l l l l ll

l l ll l l l l l

l l l ll l 

l l l l ll l

l l l l l l l l l l l

l l l l l 

l l l l

ll l l ll 

l ll l l l

She is left again

suspended in nothingness

time distorts,

if it ever exists.

Her movements are slow,

heavy, 

distorted.

Her body doesn't feel like her own, she feels not human as she goes on.

> Because she knows nothing else than going forward, to keep going no matter how futile the action might seem.

She misses the sun, warmth outside herself, she is sick of this obscurity, how weak it makes her. a perpetual weight over her.

_ What are you doing?. _

She wonders without rest. no matter the quiet pain that ripples through her body, there is no start or finish. She keeps moving...

_ What are you doing! _

She is frozen in place, the voice, her voice outside herself she turns back, eyes wide unbelieving and there she is 15 and horrible, the same image that has haunted her for life. A life she spent trying to rid herself of.

She rubs at her face, her whole being shattering, her flimsy perception of herself is done. ** _Is done!_**

“What the fuck. What the Fuck!” 

she rubs harder at her forehead, 

she bares her teeth. She is sick, her stomach swirls with acid.

What is happening?

_ What are you doing? _

<<“Shut up!”>>

she roars at Yennefer pushing the air against her crooked body, but the girl stands still, looking at her with disdain in her violet eyes.

_ Or what? _

The girl goads tilting her head mocking her.

_ Are you going to kill me? _

The words are like a physical blow.

She takes a step back, her balance skewed, 

her eyes blur, tears fall down her cheeks and she looks at her.

Yennefer, young and with that horrible blue dress from Aretuza,

the lines of her body all wrong her hair chopped.

_ “You want to, no?” _

Yennefer pushes at her, 

her words digging into her flesh, 

she feels them burrow inside her skin,

bring up inert things, 

ignored thoughts and feelings that were stored

so deep within herself to never be again.

Because she had wanted it, the evidence in her wrists,

in the pain of forging herself anew, 

in her recklessness, 

in her vehement quest. 

T here is a part of her that wanted out, after a few years the vanity and futility of life had crawled over her body like fleas sucking at her, all her hope and desires crushed by time.

Yennefer walks to her, observing, her gaze passes over her while her body disarms itself, while she cries over the face she has in front. 

_ This is it, then? _

Ynnefer’s voice is rough the accusation clear her face twisted in a snarl, a reflection of her anger. it feels like teeth pulling at her muscles, guilt sharp and jagged. She falls to her knees, into the ground. Pain pushes from the bottom of her stomach up and flows past her throat in a quiet defeated gasp. 

“I’m sorry”.

She is in front, looking down at the beauty barely alive, she follows her down, grabs her from the shoulder and with impressive strength, she forces her to look back. Violet to violet.

Yennefer's face 

_ You gutted us for this? You empty us for this?  _

She feels Yennefer’s hand open the skin of her belly, reaches for the space her womb was and pushes up. 

Her body gapes open, her ears ring, the pain is unbearable, she screams until her voice escapes her and the burning she feels is the tell of blood, her blood and her pain. How proud she was of her ability to weld pain, to inflict it. God… Tissaia was right.

How proud she was of who she had been, of the beauty of her power, and it just… it's just insignificant.

And as insignificant as she came to the world she goes insignificant, drowning in the same pain weighted by this new guilt looking at her own eyes.

Her body becomes numb, 

her fingertips stop feeling,

cold gets material, 

it encases her in the nothingness she is floating in. Tired and with a body that is too heavy to carry she closes her eyes, she lets it be, resigned.

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**_Are you giving up?_ **

She feels the voice, the words travel through her body reanimating muscles and tendons, making her nerve endings flare with sensation. Light is the first thing she identifies. she turns to it, to the voice. There is something distinctive about it, it calls her, it infuses her with life again.

**_Come on. Yennefer._ **

She recognizes the cadence of her name in that voice, the melody of it. she feels it in the depth of her being, something within herself calls back so she reaches no matter the pain that becomes a mute tempo, she reaches for the silhouette that feels familiar, that is a constant no matter how difficult and impossible it feels she reaches. Because it feels like the only way, she needs to. So she uses everything that she has gained, all the strength that she has left, the power that she was about to give up, and with it she reaches.

She screams, the light shifts, her eyes open, there is a ceiling above her. Where is she? Something is pulling her down, shadows, something, it's touching her, and then she falls.


End file.
